My Year As A Part Time Vegan

Last year for Lent I decided to go Vegan for Lent. When Lent ended I decided I actually enjoyed being a vegan and felt that the health benefits were beneficial. Then Summer came… and it got a little bit more difficult. I went aka and forth, and back and forth between my decision and my food choices. Sometimes I was vegetarian, sometimes I would go full out carnivore. After each “bad decision” I would feel as though I was letting myself down. Especially because I was dealing with PCOS so cutting out: meat, dairy, gluten, and sugar though are all beneficial to kicking PCOS in the ass, but is very difficult.

Proper food choices is always difficult for me… so after the summer ended and all of my travels I vowed to go back to being a full time Vegan. Let’s talk about what has happened since then.

My Year As A Part Time Vegan

I started a new job in September, and with my new vow to Veganism … it was difficult with all of the beginning of the school year breakfasts and luncheons. I was annoyed but I was still staying true to what I told myself I would do. I was meal planning again and cooking for myself in preparation for when I’d have to be outside of the house. Fast forward to October and I had to work a few high school fairs over the weekend. These fairs were long and tiring and I didn’t plan properly… so when my boss offered to buy every one pizza I jumped on board.

I was also dealing with a few other random life difficulties so food became an outlet as it usually does. I started bending my own rules and told myself I’d be vegan during the week, and a vegetarian on the weekends. That worked for me for about 8 weeks. I was perfectly fine being a part time vegan, especially because it seemed to be agreeing with my PCOS. Then Thanksgiving came. When I decided back in April to remain a vegan, I told myself that I would give myself three days off (talk about commitment huh…) I would eat “normal” on my birthday, on Thanksgiving, and on Christmas. When Thanksgiving rolled around I was still a bit hesitant to jump back into meat because it had been three months since I had any meat and I was nervous I’d get sick. But… I dived in and for the entire weekend I ate like a beast. I felt terribly disgusting and decided that I would get back on the wagon.

Then Christmas came… and so did Christmas vacation. I noticed that my biggest issue with being vegan is the comfort and ease of picking out food when I was out at a restaurant. Even though many places in New York have vegetarian options, vegan options are still very rare. So the more I went out over vacation, the further I went from vegan life. In 2017 I said I would be a vegan for sure… and I’ve been failing miserably. So I really needed to figure out what I really wanted to do.

Lent started about a week ago and whenever I decided to do anything for Lent I’m pretty good at following through. Let me just tell you now, that I completely bombed the first three days. I’m having an extremely difficult time figuring out what it is that I want to do, My year as a part time vegan has been great, but I now really need to decide if this is something I can commit to because it seems like going back and forth isn’ t an effective method. I love pizza and ice cream… I really just do but I want to be healthy and make better choices. I’ve been working out more, and feel that it is going in vain if I cant stick to one thing and do it well. However that may not be the Vegan route.

I’m going to go through the next 40 days as a full time vegan, and by the end I think I’ll have a final decision as to what I really want to do and how I want to get there. At the end of the day I want to do what ever works best for my PCOS and isn’t going to be a nightmare to pursue inside and outside of the home. You can follow along my journey and struggle on Snapchat and Instagram or follow along on our Vegan dedicated board on Pinterest below!

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Listen, I have been struggling with healthy eating since I got my son’s dx of autism 10yrs ago. Back then I thought I could cook, but when you are forced to give up processed foods you realize you were never cooking at all. I went from canned, boxed, microwaved to having to get a 2nd refrigerator cause one isn’t enough for all the fresh food we now eat. GfCf, Paleo, Gaps, SCD, Copper Balance, Coconut (yes there is a coconut diet)… I have tried every diet out there in an effort to heal my son.

I was 220lbs back then and had to try everything out on myself before giving to him because I knew nothing about nutrition/real food. I am now 145lbs and can say this journey saved my life along with his. In learning about food what tastes good with what, how to season what to season with, real herbs, healthy choices, etc. I went from the microwave queen to not using a microwave for 4yrs now (people are always stunned when asking for a microwave and I respond I don’t have one! They were actually illegal in other countries before capitalism and competitive innovation forced them to legalize. Stop using its bad for health and good for disease).

My son was a level 3 (scale 1 being high functioning 3 being institutional) when I started. He is now high functioning level 1 and I’m not stopping til he loses his dx. Everything I’ve learned til now has prepared me for my recent discovery Dr. Sebi and his herbs. The transition into vegan wasn’t as difficult because our diet has been so restricted for years now. We are used to being “different” when attending holiday functions so I don’t care what everyone else is eating. I’m trying to save a life here. Yo-yo is worse than anything. Not judging cause I’m there with you, but I have personally experienced the pain of going back n forth. It’s excruciating. Pick a team and play your heart out for it, eventually you won’t flip flop anymore. Maybe vegetarian is what you should start with then graduate if you choose.

I just came across something that literally broke my cravings and addictions. It was the most difficult thing I’ve done to date and you may need to work up to it, but I bet it would work wonders for your pcos. Do some research on it. Be warned, I’m very experienced (through extremely painful mistakes) with fasting so I knew what to do to get through this. The 1st 3 days were awful. Be patient with your journey. Much love lil sis you will heal I know it. ?

Thank you so much for your support and your response. While reading this I kept nodding my head in agreement. It is extremely difficult and I’m leaning more towards the Vegan life because I do enjoy it for the most part I just need to get over certain hang ups and I think it will get easier with time. I will be looking into the links you left for me. Thank you so much!